Always (Fourth Installment Of The Hunger Games) [ON HOLD]

Chapter One

Always (Fourth Installment Of The Hunger Games)
Chapter One


“Haymitch, wake up.”  I say, rather loudly.  I shake him a little. Right after all the attempts, I jump back, because he still clutches a knife in his hand when he sleeps.  Even though he has no reason to, since Paylor runs Panem, he still feels that threat.  When nothing works, I fill up a can I find on his kitchen floor, and fill it with cold water.
Haymitch fired Hazelle, so his house once again resembles a pig sty.  A mixed odor of blood, urine, and alcohol clings to everything.  Bottles and cans litter his floor.  Haymitch sits at his kitchen table, slumped over, a bottle in one hand and a knife in the other.  
Water splashes to the floor, and all over Haymitch as I dump the can over.  He immediately jumps up, and thrashes the air in front of him with his knife for a few minutes.  Eventually he turns to survey his home, and sees me standing against the wall.
“Why am I wet?”  He asks, grumpily.  He sits back down and gulps down the rest of the liquid in the bottle.  
“Couldn’t wake you up.”  I move a chair beside him, and sit down.
“Why?”  He rubs his dirty face with his hands to clean it, but the muck from his hand makes his face even more grotesque.  
Before I can answer, Effie Trinket bursts through the door.  “Big, big, big day!”  She chirps enthusiastically, and starts our way.  I couldn’t help but laugh when she stops in the middle of the kitchen, and her face crumples up so bad at the smell, she bursts out of the door.  “Big, big, big smell...”  She mumbles from outside.  
Haymitch groans, and leans his head against the table again.
“I’ll go get Peeta instead.”  Effie says.
I remember where I left Peeta.  He didn’t sleep well last night, so I left him sleeping while I went to awaken a drunken Haymitch.  I burst after Effie, and block my door from her.  
“What are you doing?”  She asks.  I can see her anger rising behind the pounds of makeup and the bright pink wig.  Manners are important to her, and I’m not being very polite right now.
“He’s sleeping,”  I say.  “I’ll wake him up, we’ll eat, then we’ll go to Haymitch’s.  In an hour.  Okay?”  
She purses her lips while she considers this deal.  Going back into that house seems like her biggest fear right about now.  After a few moments, she nods slightly.  Her smile seems to be slapped back on her face, and she once again sings, “Big, big, big day!” And disappears into Haymitch’s house in the Victor’s Village.  I can hear her screeching at him about lacking personal hygiene.  
Dread floods through me as I go up the stairs, heading for the bedroom.  The last thing we need right now is to be slapped back into the public.  Effie has arranged an interview, led by Cesear Flickerman.  Apparently he survived the deadly war, and travels all around Panem to interview people.  A few months back, he interviewed my mother, in front of the hospital in District 3 she helped set up.  She burst into tears when he mentioned my name, and she said how much she loves and misses me.  She wishes me best with Peeta.  I blushed for weeks when she asked when she’ll be getting grand children.
Me and Peeta have been together for a while.  We live in the same house in the Victors Village.  Since I lived alone, he moved in with me soon after we got back.  His family still lives in the house that technically is his, but everyone in the Seam knows Peeta and I live together.  
Peeta still has some issues with the former hijacking of his memories with the trackerjacker.  We call them attacks.  Every once and a while, he comes across a memory he didn’t sort through, with the Real or Not Real game.  They usually happen at night, when his dreams bring back the memories.  His fists will clench and sometime he screams.  
We both still have nightmares.  Horrible nightmares, that usually involve the Games, or President Snow.  But we’re here for eachother.  The other would wake the other up, and calm them down.  Me and Peeta are still a team.
Always.
I enter the bedroom, and my mouth curves into a smile.  Peeta looks just like he did before the first Games, when he sleeps.  Free from stress, and worries.  He looks so young, too.  I watch his eyebrows furrow, as he pats the sheets next to him in his sleep.
“Katniss...”  He mumbles against the pillows.  
His stirring ceases after a minute or two, and I sit next to him on the bed.  The movement and the shifting of the bed wakes him up, and his eyelids flutter and open.  His blue eyes lock into my gray ones, and he smiles.  His arm grasps onto mine, and he pulls me down next to him.  
“Good morning,”  He whispers, in a sleepy voice.
I smile, and brush his hair out of his eyes.  I decide to just lay it on him.  “Effie is here.”
All traces of sheer happiness drain from his face, and he groans, smashing his face against the pillow.  “Why.”  
“The interview with Cesear.”  I inform him.  
Before I can realize what’s happening, he slides an arm under my back and lifts me onto him.  His lips are stretched into a grin.  “No.  I’m keeping you here.”
Laughter escapes my lips, and I sit up, on his hips.  “We’re both being interviewed, Peeta.”  
“And I care, why?”  Happiness laces his words, and his hands rest on my hips.  I think the only people I’m comfortable touching me, is Peeta and my prep team.
The door flings open, revealing Venia, Flavius, and Octavia.  Octavia squeals in joy at the sight of me and Peeta.  The last time I saw her, was probably in 13.  
“You guys are so cute!”  She exclaims.  Her skin is dyed a lighter green than usual, and her smile is contagious.  
My cheeks redden, and I slide off of Peeta.
“I know she is,”  He says, with a smirk.  
Venia and Flavius stand me up, and take a look at me.  “Beauty Stage Zero, I think.  Then we can go from there.”  
“Can Peeta stay in here with me?”  I ask.  
“We need to work on him, too, so yes.”  
I guess he needs a prep team, too.  Since his was killed.
“Peeta you sit and relax, we’ll get to you after Katniss.”  Venia says, and starts plucking at my eyebrows.  “Katniss I told you these things need to be tamed!”
“I didn’t think I’d still be doing interviews!”  I try to defend myself.  
“Wow, they do a lot to you huh, Katniss?”  Peeta laughs, laying on the bed.  
Before I can even answer, they whisk me into the bathroom, leaving the door ajar.  They strip me of my clothes, so they can wax me again.  I turn, and watch Peeta.  As soon as they took off my shirt, he averted his gaze.  Probably for me, not because he didn’t want to look.  
“Can we close the door?”  I whisper to Flavius. Peeta’s head turns, and I know he heard me.  His eyes stay on my face, though.
Venia giggles.  “Not like he hasn’t seen it before!”
“I haven’t,”  Says Peeta.
My whole prep team gasps.  “Aren’t you guys married?”
I let out a laugh, and Peeta explains.
“That was just for the public, we aren’t actually married. That proposal was fake.”
I see tears develop in Venia’s eyes, and she blinks them away.  “But you guys are perfect together!  Why not?”
“Just haven’t found the right time to ask, I guess.”  Peeta says softly.  “I’ll leave you guys to get her more beautiful than she already is.”  He walks out of the room in his boxers.  I’m guessing he’s going to get dressed in the other room.
Thoughts swarm in my head.  Haven’t found the right time to ask?  I knew this was coming, but now that it’s so close I’m growing nervous.  It’s not that I don’t want to marry Peeta, because I frankly can’t see a future without him, it’s just the concept of marriage that knocks me off my feet.  In a way, marriage is just being a team, and aren’t Peeta and I good at that already? And knowing Effie, she’d make the whole ceremony public.  
“Hello?  Katniss?  Earth to lover-girl?”  Octavia waves a hand in front of my face.
“Sorry. What?” I say.
“He’s going to propose!  You can just tell!”  She flutters.  
I try to zone out, while they work their magic.  I’m poked and prodded and plucked until I feel like a raw piece of game that lost it’s feathers.  I hear snippets of them complaining that I bite my nails, and don’t take good care of my hair.  Probably the only positive thing I’ve heard about the up keeping of my body is that the burns from the war are nearly invisible now.  So when they put the makeup on me, my skin appears flawless.
“Let’s go show your prince charming how we made you pretty again!”  Octavia chirps.
I take it as a compliment, knowing it was intended as one.  I smile at her, and stand up.  “Clothing would be nice.”  I laugh lightly.
“Oh! I nearly forgot!”  Flavius bursts out of the room, and comes back quickly with a bag draped over his arm.  He pulls out a dress.  The upper part is black, and has long sleeves, and it’s tight fitting. The lower part is an animal print I can’t name, and it flows out away from my body, stopping a few inches above my knees.  It wouldn’t t reveal anything up top except my collarbones.  I put my arms up as they slide the dress on, and zip up the back.  They put soft black high heels on my feet, and hold out a mirror in front of me.
I can’t help but smile at my reflection.  My skin has slightly tanned more than usual, from the summer sun, and for once I have natural looking makeup.  In a way, I missed my prep team.  “It’s beautiful,”  I say.
“You’re beautiful.”  Venia smiles at me.  “Now go get Peeta and bring him up here, please. We’ll give you a moment together.”  
I nod, and head downstairs.  The shoes make me uneasy and I slip them off on the stairs, and pad down to Peeta.
He hasn’t even dressed yet.  Still in boxers, Peeta stands in front the oven, holding a pan filled with some sort of bread.  The smell of cinnamon and sugar reaches my nose, and I smile, going into the kitchen.  He hears me coming, and turns around.
“You’re beautiful,”  He says, and opens his arms.  Without hesitating, I wrap my arms around his neck, and his arms hold me against his chest.  “And I love you.”  
My cheeks heat up, and I smile.  “I know.”  I laugh lightly, and take his hand, leading him upstairs.  “You’re turn!”  
He groans, and follows me, reluctantly.  “At least they don’t pluck every hair from me, like they do to you.”  
“I’ll make them wax your legs.”  I threaten, a grin on my lips.  
My prep team waits by the bedroom door, and laugh at my threat.
“Isn’t she a peach?”  Peeta laughs, and follows them into the bedroom.